The Petrobras Scandal: Year In Review 2015

After much delay and controversy, on April 22, 2015, a somber-looking team of newly appointed managers at Petrobras announced at a press conference in Rio de Janeiro that Brazil’s giant majority state-owned oil and gas company had lost $17 billion to mismanagement and graft.

Moreover, they said that the company would have to sell almost the same amount in assets and postpone investment plans to regain its financial footing. With Petrobras’s market value reduced by half and burdened by a $100 billion debt, the firm further acknowledged in documents filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in May that it would have to revise its ambitious program of investments.

“We have a feeling of shame,” said newly named CEO Aldemir Bendine, describing the company as a victim of extensive wrongdoing. “I offer an apology on behalf of Petrobras’s employees, because I am now one of them,” he added before presenting the first audited balance sheet that the company had been able to produce in more than eight months.